Opinion: Orwell Lives

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

I ... welcome back to Opinion Journal why Mary Kissel Oxford professor chair RealCup Ramadan delivered that twenty thirteen or while lecture in London earlier this week ... to my next guest is asking ... why would you honor this guy I've got assistant books editor saw Rob Omar is here to explain ... the sore from ... dealers who are familiar ... voices professor ... Tarek Ramadan is a Swiss foreign ... of Egyptian origin professor of Islamic studies ... aam is also the grandson of one of the founders of the Muslim Brotherhood ... he's a consistent if you know defender ... of Islam is groups and ideologies in Europe ... he's quite favored among some ... in the liberal left in the U S and Europe who look to him as a moderate Islam is that he's been consistently reveal themselves to be anything but ... so why ... was the Orwall lecture in one in a CD and in his work ... that they are celebrating although Orwell lecture is easy project of the Orwell Prize which is the most prestigious um British prize for for political writing ... and full of political thought ... um and presumably it's associated with the values that we associate with Orwell chief among them ... no individual rights freedom of speech ... and da da that ... I'm you know Western democracies for all their imperfections are better ... time than any other form of of ... the way of organizing society ... Park Ramadan does not represent the Saudis ... he he he he he he will not refuse the stoning of women under Sharia law in two thousand three he was asked by diplomats are cozy Mr. Ahmed a ... week and then stoning he said no ... let's have a moratorium during which to discuss the moratorium to discuss right so when anything to the Arab Spring they he's actually been quite paranoid about the Arab Spring because he thinks the Arab Spring was something that acts ... by Western corporations in this EIA and so forth ... to try to de stabilize the Arab world so the ... music and oratorio come back to make a and I just wanna pick on him I mean there are other so-called these views of Opel why did these in ... the state ... he thinks it's a conspiracy ... um how I how do these kinds of music become so mainstream and he will be chosen for this kind of a war to mean is there something ... happening in British political are called troll life that ... explains the US ... I need to London it as far as I can tell is just a hotbed of going to go ... to the worst people to ask God to comment on things addition be commenting on ... on ... the Guardian newspaper as you know I mean besides the Graham Greene Greenwald the um the Snowden affair it frequently brings Hamas spokesman has speak on those issues it doesn't mean those people shouldn't speak for they don't need access ... to this and to the most prestigious ... institutions the balance ... of of of of a break to mock or if they do let's be honest about what they believe in the implications of what they believe this is a new senators sober Marty ... thank you so much for ... joining us ...